I bought my 07 Focus 3 door last May from a Ford main dealer. It had one previous owner who had put 9000 miles on the clock in the year he had had it. As it has a plastic painted roof spoiler I was no longer able to use the boot mounted cycle carrier I had previously used on the 03 Focus I had replaced. This was because the straps would have put too much tension on the spoiler.

I set about looking at alternative solutions and opted for roof bars and cycle carriers.

Having checked the Ford website and Accessories catalogue I was able to source the correct authentic Ford roof bars and Thule 591 roof carriers from EBay (both used).

Last week I went to fit the roof bars for the first time, removed the blanking plates from the roof of the car only to find there are no screwholes underneath, Just painted metal.

Needless to say, having paid the best part of £200 for the kit I was fuming.

Some may say I should have checked beforehand but why would Ford not include the machining of fitting points in to the manufacturing process for all its Focuses? The roof bar information on all the documentation states it can be used on 3 door cars.

I want to approach the dealer I bought the car from to complain about the situation I'm now in. Is there any point in this (other than to make me feel a bit better!)?

The only solution I'm left with is to invest in a towbar and utilise a towbar mounted carrier. I note in an earlier posting these are seemingly highly rated. Obviously there will be another cost attached to this. Read more

inside of the last 3 weeks, ive moted three cars all failed on just headlights, online fee £27 headlight adjustment £11.50 . any body else noticing this trend Read more

hi there folks

can somebody please help me! i carried out an engine change 3 weeks ago on my 306 turbo diesel and have since then been trying to get it to start with no luck. I have diesel up to the injector pump but cant get anything out, the engine just turns over and over. From what i have read im guessing it is the immobiliser stopping the pump from injecting diesel. i have no keypad immobiliser. I have the later Lucus pump. i have today cut off the tamper proof cover which covers the stop solenoid and found 2 black wires to it. i have one blue plug with 3 wires and a black plug with 4 wires going to the pump. its got to the stage now im pulling my hair out and everytime i look at the car its enough to give me a headache. Could somebody PLEASE tell me how to bypass this. i can understand if you dont want to post this so you can email me direct at domonic.hatton@tiscali.co.uk. Somebody PLEASE HELP ME

Cheers Dom Read more

Hi there

My Ford KA failed its MOT yesterday. On the failure sheet it said ?insufficient reserve rear brake pedal movement? and the guy at the garage said that there was too much travel in the pedal. I presume this means it goes to far towards the floor with the engine running.

I have done the following:
- Blead through all 4 brakes (used half a bottle of fluid). Front ones seemed a little gassy on first couple of pumps but fine after.
- Checked disks (seem fine) and pads (at least 4mm tread left)
- Cleaned rear brakes (inside of drums)s
- Observed cylinders to be neither seized of leaking
- Observed shoes to have 2/3 remaining tread
- Re-set rear self adjuster to zero and heard them clicking when applying brakes after refitting drums

Advisory notices were ? ?hand brake borderline pass? and ?rear brake efficiency borderline pass?.

The guy at the garage said it was probably a case of adjusting the rear shoes. I have read on a couple of other forums that the rear self adjusters can be inaccurate ? surely if I could hear them clicking then they are working, or not?! Does it sound like the cylinders are shot?

Also I heave read that the front pads can be troublesome on the KA. Would this cause travel in the pedal? I would have thought not as they are also self adjusting. Does the application of the pedal not just move the callipers a certain distance? If the pads/ disks became powdery / flexible when worn then I could justify changing them.

Any advice would be much appreciated as I have spent about 5 hours working on them this weekend and the pedal seems to be as it was in the first place. I know I?m a newbie but I have just successfully changed two suspension coils on the KA today so in return for the advice I will post a ?How too? guide shortly including the pics?

Thanks in advance!
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Hey.
ive just driven my car over to germany as im posted with the army, got my EU lights on and all that but have failed my first bfg road worthyness test due to my left rear fog light not working. ive just had a look at each side and the working foglight has a blue and black wire going to the connecter but the left side is missing this wire. any advice on how to get the left hand fog light working would be trumendously appreciated.

cheers guys Read more